Bird Flu

[Valarie Vousden]

i'm just wondering what everyone's take on the bird flu is. is it the animals
way of getting out of this plane of existence before the change (if so, to go
where)? if it wipes out birds, as well as other animals--a house cat was in
today's news--that makes me sad. i'll miss them very much. i'm such a softy for
animals. i don't buy into the fear negatives are trying to peddle. it's possible
it may effect some humans but i'm not buying into the epidemic thing. still it
could be an exit point for people that want to get out, i suppose.

anyway, what are your thoughts? just curious.
l/l,
valarie


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[Petrus]

> i'm just wondering what everyone's take on the bird flu is.

i'm not hugely worried about it, personally. the virus simply is not
particularly contagious. from what i've read, there haven't been more than
200 human cases so far.

the virus' ability to jump to humans from birds or other animals is still
highly immature and unstable. yes, said ability probably will stabilise at
some point. if it does, we probably will see a moderate mortality rate
initially...but:-
a) it will be primarily in the third world/areas with very high population
density and poor hygiene, and
b) the mortality rate will fairly quickly taper off. it isn't in a virus's
own best interests to be so potent as to quickly kill its' host...because if
the host dies too quickly, the virus dies too.

so...although i'm not a virologist as such, the high lethality and low
infection rate both lead me to believe that this is a relatively new strain
of influenza...it probably hasn't been around i'm guessing for more than 15
years, tops...probably considerably less than that.

to conclude, though...yes, it probably will cause some problems in some
areas, but no, it's not going to be a global killer, and it probably won't
even be lethal for more than 18 months or so either, at the very most. the
media and a lot of people are hyping bird flu to try and keep the atmosphere
of fear going...but the disease really isn't that big a deal.

[Elmer]

> i'm just wondering what everyone's take on the bird flu is.


pi was correct in that there are fewer than 200 deaths world-wide from the
bird flu. by comparison, the centers for disease control reports that 36,000
people died last year from the "regular" flu in the united states alone.

now ask yourself why the news media would even bother.

elmer


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